If management were assholes they could tie the exit interview into an employee’s incentive bonus. I.e. If the policy is that the incentive bonus will be prorated according to the month you leave, they could add a clause saying you forfeit the bonus if you refuse to do an exit interview. Another way to make it “mandatory” is to tie it to equipment turn in (computers, keys, badges, etc., etc.) I don’t think interviewing people against their will is likely to be productive though.
Place I’ve worked you give up any part of a bonus if you leave in the middle of the year. And I’m not sure how you’d tie it into equipment turn in. “Okay, you won’t accept my laptop, I’ll just take it. Sign here, please.”
But yeah, the point is moot since feedback under duress is even more useless than normal feedback.
I wonder what the percentage of companies who do that are. My company always prorated bonuses for partial year worked.
I got up and walked out of a job in the middle of a shift. Just up and left, didn’t tell anyone, let those fuckers figure out for themselves that I wasn’t there. Then the HR guy emailed me for an exit interview. I let loose (in my email - I didn’t bother to see him in person). His response was boilerplate “thank you for your input into how we can improve the employee experience yada yada yada…”
I think the only exit interview I did was about 25 years ago when I left my first real newspaper job. I vaguely recall answering their questions honestly and thoughtfully, because I was young enough to be under the mistaken impression that they actually cared.
When they want my opinion, they’ll give it to me.
Very generous of them. Our bonuses were all results oriented, with sometimes a bit of performance thrown in, so they weren’t always know until the end of the year.
Now I don’t know what happens if you got laid off. Then maybe you’d get something as part of the package, but I never got laid off.
The place I retired from didn’t have bonuses, or at least nor for anyone below VP level, so it wasn’t an issue.
Yeah, compared to most they were generous. Our bonuses were results oriented as well, and I forgot the caveat that you had to work at least until July 1st to qualify. If you quit after that before the end of the year, you were mailed a check (or it might have been direct deposit) for your pro-rated share.
Mine only prorates incentives for employees who retire, go on long term disability, or are let go as part of a workforce reduction. Otherwise if you’re not employed with us as of the last workday of the year you aren’t eligible to receive the bonus. A few years back we had an employee who put in her notice and quit in early December. Incentives aren’t paid out until the end of the 1st quarter of the following year and she called to inquire about the status of her bonus. I was the lucky fellow who had to give her the unhappy news. I did feel bad for her, if she had stayed with us just 2-3 more weeks she would have received about $7,000.
I left my last job because my boss’s boss was replaced a year earlier and he made several changes that stomped out innovation and creativity. I and other ended up spending more time in more wasteful meetings, and this in a smallish company of 85 people.
I otherwise had like working there. I had been there 3 years, and this was leaving way too soon for me.
I carefully crafted feedback and rationale for me resignation. I slept on it first, to check that its tone wasn’t one of anger (and I was mad), but one of helpful, constructive criticism.
Within two months of my leaving, that VP was gone. He was asked to leave. My feedback may possibly have helped in his departure.
It is very good that he is gone!
I’ve only done one. It was really quick.
“Shannon, you’re a great employee. We’re disappointed you’re leaving. Do you mind telling me why?”
“Because I go to college 130 miles from here and the new semester starts next week.”
“Oh. Have a good school year!”
We had a VP that was a pathological liar. Made for lots of drama, and really complicated drama (“Watch what you say. The big boss hired him as a protege, anything less than abject praise of him will get Biggus Bossus on your case for a month.”).
I had an ugly meeting with the big boss, where I showed him proof of pathological liar’s pathological lying. I assumed it would just be “evidence added to a growing list of transgressions”, but an hour later pathological liar was leaving with a box of his stuff.
That meeting wasn’t technically an exit interview, but it turned out to be his!
There is justice sometimes!